Happy Chinese New Year!

To me, making new year resolution is categorized under the ‘mandatory’ column instead of the ‘good to do’. I am a believer of the ‘law of attraction’, or whatever law you like to call it. I believe that once you have your eyes set on a concrete target, and of course make reasonable attempt to make it happen, it WILL happen. Sounds a lot like what most religions preach, doesn’t it?

The recent 2 books that I’ve been reading (not so sure which ones, probably Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert or The Servant by James C. Hunter) quoted the same story. It goes something like this… A man repeatedly and diligently prayed to god every day without fail, “God, please please please, I wish to be rich.” Day after day, he prayed with all his might. Eventually, God could not stand it anymore and said to the man, “Son, please please please, go buy a lottery!” A simple yet compelling story.

Spiderman II was on TV just now. I can’t help but to quote the final words from Peter Parker – “You always have a choice.” I never understood the significance of this phrase until one day in 2006, a mentor of mine went berserk on me when I said, “It was just natural. No choice.”

We were talking about my journey before I landed where I was at that time. He (the mentor) asked why I had chosen to major in Information System Management, why I did not stay back in the US to work, why I chose to work with that company. My answers were along the line of… the options were limited… I didn’t have many choices… it just seemed natural that I ventured into these fields. Hearing these ‘irresponsible words’, as I would now call them, he went on and on on how we are always responsible for our lives, and we always have a choice! Always. I remember him saying, “When you accepted this job, you made a decision to take on the roles and responsibilities. You do have a choice to reject the offer and do other things, whether it is sitting at home doing nothing, or looking for another job opportunity. When you decided to come home after graduation, you made a decision to not stay in the US and work. If you decided to work in the US, you would try hard to make way for that to happen!”

You get the point. Since then, “I don’t have a choice” is forever out of my vocabulary… because you always have a choice.

I guess I should make this holiday break more productive by writing down my resolutions :) Please do the same if you have not done so!

The 1st City Rangers Invitation 2011

What started as a mere thought has blossomed into a fun filled weekend.

After losing a few semi-finals in 2010, a few of us were a little disheartened by the fact that our fitness and skills have become rusty from the lack of practice, proper practice, that is. Aside from the fact that we have always had fun playing alongside each other, we started to realise the lack of young prospects in the sport. They are not to be blamed, as we are definitely not scarce in talents, though not in abundance… players with good height, long arms, long legs, good leap, good reflects, good body coordination…. did I mention good leap?

Anyway, we initiated weekly training last year and attempted to secure a good coach. Learning from the few ‘L’s, we desperately needed a coach, as competing, strategising a game and coaching at the same time apparently did not work. We had a coach for a while, which we were totally thrilled about, but soon lost him due to the lack of commitment, from both sides, sadly. Despite the challenges we have been facing, we made it a point to hold on to what we have started, half dragging and half pushing each other along the way; the thought of quitting mercilessly bouncing off our minds.

In November, after all the craziness in our personal lives, we finally managed to free up some time to put some plans into action, among them was to organise our very own tournament. With very limited resources, we knew that we needed enough creativity and proper planning to make it work. In the midst of our preparation came the idea of raising funds for a teammate who unfortunately had to undergo surgery due to injury. Those were the ideas and the rest was history.

Drawing of Lots

For the drawing of lots, Eric & Teck Eng were kind enough to let us tag along their house warming cum gathering party at their place. It was more like a gathering of old friends, with lots of catching up and laughter. Aside from the good food and chitchats, we carried out a simple briefing for players and the drawing of lots.

Pool P	Pool Q
AXEL	CRVC
KL Juniors	SSBJ
Zenne	Pudu Girls

Day 1 – 15th Jan 2011

We arrived few hours before the first match to setup for the tournament. Things came together in time and many lent their pair of hands which sped up our work a great deal. Our equipment manager (Hai) did a wonderful job in getting the gears ready for the game, from the stationary, to the score sheets, to the garbage bag!

Each team played 2 games to the best of 5. IAfter day 1, AXEL ranked 1st in Pool P, followed by Zenne and KL Juniors. CRVC won both games, hence became the group champion in Pool Q, followed by SSBJ and Pudu Girls.

Before the day ended, all participants and supporters submitted their very important votes for the following awards. Everybody was guessing… Who would win the Most Beautiful Player?

1. The Most Beautiful Player 最漂亮球员
2. The Cutest Player  最可爱球员
3. The Most Powerful Player 力大无穷奖
4. The Most Creative Hairstyle 最有创意发型奖
5. The Most Generous Person 最慷慨达人
6. The Most Creative Jersey 最有创意球衣
7. Fair Play Award 最佳体育精神奖
8. The Best Team Spirit Award 最高士气奖

Thanks to everyone’s cooperation and hard work, day 1 went well.

 

 

  

Day 2 – 16th Jan 2011

Day 2 started with 2 semifinal matches between SSBJ & AXEL, and CRVC & Zenne. We were very happy to see the level of standard in these matches.

As usual, SSBJ girls were always energetic and athletic, not to mention young and tall! Despite their advantage in fitness and physical attributes, experience prevailed when they had to play the more skilled seniors from the AXEL team, which consisted the likes of current and ex national players, and mostly ex-SSBJ students!

The next semifinal was between the City Rangers and Zenne. It was a little challenging to run the tournament and participate in games at the same time, but all Rangers showed great team spirit and we still enjoyed the game. Zenne put up a good fight before bowing out in the end.

The 5th/6th placing game took place right after, between the Pudu Girls and the KL Juniors. It was a battle of ex an current KL players! The game was fun to watch, as both were defensive teams, which also means long rallies and lots of sprawling. The KL Juniors managed to squeeze a ‘W’ in the end. Great job girls! Thumbs up for the Pudu girls too for the great team spirit that makes the tournament even livelier!

The final match (CRVC vs. AXEL) was the one that we have been really looking forward to. Old rivalry yanno :) We always look forward to play each other, simply because we love the competitiveness. In the end, AXEL team emerged as the champion! We would like to give credit to the great display of skills from our opponent. I’m sure everyone, especially the youngsters from SSBJ and KL juniors, learned a lot from just watching the games.

From the City Rangers, we wish we could have put up more fight as we literally ran out of steam, sad to say, perhaps due to our ambitious plan to forgo the Libero :-p It is not an excuse for losing the game though. I’m sure we still have plenty of room for improvement and they were the better team that night. With that said, we still gave our best an enjoyed every minute of the game. I personally love the challenge and would love for more opportunity like this! We came close on several occasions, but just could not convert in the end. We are already looking for the next opportunity to play each other. That’s for sure!!

       

Immediately after the final whistle, we wasted no time and switched into work mode to get the stage ready for closing and awards. Mr. Jimmy, our KLAVA President graced our ceremony with his inspiring closing speech. He was glad with in our effort in organising this invitation and proud of our kind intention. He also announced the good news of the 1st KL Open to be organised in March! Stay tuned!

Next, Monica shared her excitement to be part of this invitation, as a sponsor “Chillex” and a player. All players and winners of this tournament would receive cash and discount vouchers from Chillex, a local restaurant & cafe in Bandar Puteri Puchong. Thanks a lot Monic!!! Thanks Chillex!

All 6 teams were recognised and and given prizes. The Champion, 1st and 2nd runner up teams received Chillex vouchers, hampers from G&G, creative trophies (created from scratch by Chia, Jessie & Yen Er… very impressive) and a round of applause! To mark the uniqueness of the City Rangers Invitation, we made it a point to create an exclusive Championship T-shirt for the Champion team of this tournament.

Champion – AXEL

1st Runner-up – CRVC

2nd Runner-up – SSBJ

Finally, it was time to reveal the individual and team award winners! Here we go:

The Most Creative Jersey 最有创意球衣 - AXEL
AXEL winning by ONE vote!! Next to CRVC.

Fair Play Award 最佳体育精神奖 – Bukit Jalil Sports School

The Best Team Spirit Award 最高士气奖 - CRVC

 

The Cutest Player  最可爱球员 – Shafiqah (AXEL) & Shima (KL Junior)
Same number of votes! But since they live together, sharing the prize would not be a problem :D Cute!

 

The Most Powerful Player 力大无穷奖 – Azura (KL Juniors)
Winner also received an exclusive Most Powerful Superman belt :)

The Most Creative Hairstyle 最有创意发型奖 – Kuck Sea Yeng (Zenne)

The Most Generous Person 最慷慨达人 – Eric (AXEL)
Because of Eric, a friend and one of the sponsors (AXEL) for this invitation, we had a great opening party, all teams received AXEL brand sports socks, and our fund raising was a little more successful ;) Thanks Eric!!!

The Most Beautiful Player 最漂亮球员 – Yew Sook Ting aka. Xiao Mei (SSBJ)

 

Special Appreciation:

1. G&G for sponsoring gift hampers
2. AXEL for sponsoring sports socks for all participants
3. Chillex for sponsoring discount and cash vouchers
4. Volunteer referees from KLAVA and volleyball friends from UKM
     

    5.   All competing teams for your kindness and active participation!!

• AXEL
• Zenne
• Bukit Jalil Sports School
• Pudu Girls
• KL Juniors (KLAVA)
• City Rangers Volleyball Club (CRVC)

Last and most importantly, I would like to thank all who had lent us your helping hand and those who made this happen. Thanks to our friends who cared to stopped by (at the court or on Facebook) to show your support!

Great job Rangers! We did it!!!

Look out for our future activities on our City Rangers Facebook page!